July/August 2008

Irving P. Krick: Weather Fraud or Weather Genius

by Randy Cerveny and Ron Holle

Irving P. Krick, one of the first WIDELY-KNOWN commercial meteorologists in the United States, cut a controversial swath across the meteorological field during the middle of the twentieth century and, in so doing, earned both avid fans and fervent critics around the world. Krick’s most ardent supporters point to a number of accomplishments he made over the years, including helping provide weather forecasts for the invasions of Normandy and North Africa during World War II and becoming one of the first proponents of cloud-seeding technology. But many established meteorologists questioned the techniques that Krick used to arrive at his forecasts. Meanwhile, the commercial meteorological activities that grew out of his forecasting techniques after the war aroused the profound ire of the National Weather Bureau when he claimed that he could call the weather far better than its forecasters could.